Shoulda Woulda Coulda
There should have been a blog post today. Nominally, I write them in the morning (veery early) or the day before and schedule them. However, well, what I would do on one day rarely works on another day around here. I thought, when I was a young and naive mother of babies and toddlers, that the magical time when all of my younglings were teens would mean relative independence, both for them, and for me.
Muhahahahaa... Ahem. Not to scare any young mothers in the audience, but oh, how I miss naptimes. No, mine are always awake, and by always, I mean I rarely spook at noises going bump in the middle of the night because it's probably just an insomniac teen making themselves a snack. And when I thought that they wouldn't need me (cue dramatic self-deprecating sniff, woe, mother, for thy children have flown...) I couldn't have been more wrong. They need me now more than ever, and furthermore, they challenge me in ways that toddlers didn't. It's not hard to help a toddler. Tie shoes, pour milk, tuck them into bed. A teen? Well, let me reflect on my long, relaxing weekend with three teens at home.
Friday after a long day of work I came home, switched to the truck, picked up the boy, and dragged my tired butt to Ikea with him so we could pick up his bed. Mistake #1: going to Ikea exhausted and brain dead. We got home and while I was more worried about trying to get dinner and deal with an incoming snowstorm and the Junior Mad Scientist getting home from work... he was champing at the bit to assemble his bed.
Flash forward to Saturday. The weather is ugly and getting uglier as I take the JMS to work, and return to announce that no one was going anywhere in this weather. The boy wants his bed. So we said fine, you can get out the instruction book and read it: Mistake #2. Some time later (rabbit) he came into the other room with me asking 'why is this a bunk bed?' And I learned something. Ikea will put the same name on two VERY different products. Mistake #3: We'd picked up the wrong bed.
Sunday: same bad weather, different day. I baked. Laundry and cleaning happened. Monday: finally, it's nice enough to get out of the house. I drag myself back to Ikea with the wrong bed, pick up the right bed, take the Ginja Ninja to the yarn store (which was amazing, as always. Such luscious yarns I really wish I had time to do handworks). Back to the house, then back out again for the other part of the family's shopping. The JMS needed geeky clothes, so the mall it was. Then home, and trying to assemble the Little Man's bed, while making dinner and helping the GN create a web banner for her Poisonous Fun page... three ring circus and I'm the ringmaster. I wasn't quite supervising some of this as closely as I should have been. Mistake #4: The boy has lost three screws vital to the bed.
Some days, I look back, and say 'I coulda stayed in bed, you know?'
It's the hardest job you'll ever love. I've come too far to turn back now, I'm in it for the long haul. I can see glimmers, at times, of what promises to be some very dull days just packed full of free time. For the moment, I will shut myself in my room after dinner and try to write, a little bit, just for sanity's sake.